I'm going to say something even more shocking and outrageous: I think they should have regen braking on bikes. Moreover, I think they should allow them in races.
Think about the amount of energy the elite racers could store in a long descent. Instead of calipers, or in addition to calipers, you'd have simple DC motors/generators (probably brushless)in the hub. Put on the brake, you'd generate electricity. Put on the brake harder, the caliper would activate.
Later on in the race, you'd have tactical decisions to make. When do I start using stored power? In the climb, or in the sprint?
There'd be rules... Everyone would have to start the race/stage with zero charge, for example. And there'd be stages/races where you'd decide the weight penalty isn't worth it. For a pure hill climb, it wouldn't be worth it. But for those epic days where you have 3 1,500 meter climbs, you'd go with the regen bike.
I can also see this being especially useful in a touring bike, or even a commuting bike.
One thing I've never understood: You can get a pretty darned nice motorcycle, with more precision parts in the cylinder head than there are in an entire bicycle... For about the same price as a bicycle. Yeah, you can get a pretty sweet bicycle for $8k. There are also some pretty sweet motorcycles for $8k.
No one has ever explained to me how that works. Bottom-line, though: You can bet a good regen brake system for a bicycle would run $12,000. There's no real reason for it to, but it would.
